The Mutual Fund Dealers Association of Canada is seeking to suspend the planned implementation of new performance reporting requirements, to allow it to harmonize its rules with similar rules being proposed by the Canadian Securities Administrators.

The MFDA said Thursday that he CSA has requested that the self-regulatory organization take steps to suspend implementation of its new performance reporting rule, pending harmonization with CSA performance reporting standards that are ultimately adopted.

MFDA staff intends to recommend the suspension of the June 2012 implementation to the MFDA board of directors at its next scheduled meeting on November 29.

Last July the CSA approved proposed changes to MFDA performance reporting requirements, and the MFDA members approved the changes at their annual meeting last December. The new requirements were set to take effect in June 2012 to give dealers time to develop and implement systems changes to comply with the new rule.

Since then, the CSA has published its own proposed changes to performance reporting requirements, which recently completed a public comment period, and are currently under consideration. If adopted, the CSA amendments would introduce new performance reporting requirements and additional cost disclosure obligations.

Among the comments received on the CSA proposals, were complaints about potential inconsistencies between the proposed CSA amendments and the new MFDA rule, and concerns that dealers would potentially have to undertake two sets of costly systems and statement changes to meet both sets of requirements.